(AP) With an early start time, a late-arriving crowd and a huge rivalry game to look ahead to, No. 23 Iowa could have easily overlooked heavy underdog Fairleigh Dickinson. The Hawkeyes still had more than enough energy to put aside the Knights. Gabe Olaseni tied a career high with 14 points and had 10 rebounds as Iowa pulled away to a 92-59 victory Monday night, its 10th win of the season. Melsahn Basabe had 12 points and 11 rebounds for the Hawkeyes (10-1), who broke the game open with an early 19-0 run and led by at least 20 points

On Monday, the 12 Big Ten men’s basketball coaches joined the Big Ten teleconference to discuss non-conference action and look ahead to conference play, which tips off on New Year’s Eve. We’ve posted the audio for each coach on the call here, and will do so again when weekly calls begin in January. Listen to coach Tom Crean: Listen to coach Fran McCaffery: Listen to coach John Groce: Listen to coach Chris Collins: Listen to coach Patrick Chambers: Listen to coach Matt Painter: Listen to coach Tom Izzo: Listen to coach Bo Ryan: Listen to coach John Beilein: Listen to

Before the NCAA banned on-court stickers, Tom Izzo and several of his fellow coaches made it known they weren’t fans of them. It’s not because the stickers resulted in an eye-sore, but because they were a slipping hazard and caused injury. ESPN found another way to get the Big Ten/ACC Challenge logo on the courts during this week’s event. The network digitally inserted the “stickers” on the court. And, you wouldn’t have known the stickers were missing unless you attended one of the games. These ACC-Big Ten Challenge emblems are being inserted digitally by ESPN. Wild: pic.twitter.com/U4Tcj0Aof9 — Land-Grant Holy

The Big Ten put itself in a hole Tuesday night, going 2-4 against the Atlantic Coasters. Let’s take a look at just how it happened. We had predicted a split on the Challenge’s opening night, and we were awfully close to going six-for-six. How close? Well, in the one game we missed, Illinois held a 12-point lead over Georgia Tech with the ball and seven minutes remaining. In that situation, Georgia Tech had a win probability of just 2.8 percent. If you set up those teams with that time and score a hundred times, you’d expect Illinois to lose only three

It’s that time of year again, when the powers of the Midwest exert their basketball dominance over the Atlantic Coasters. Or at least that’s been the story in recent years, with the Big Ten taking three of the last four Challenges (last season was an unsatisfying tie). We won’t talk about what happened in the 10 prior Challenges. We’re going to give a quick rundown on each of the 12 games, complete with our picks. First, here’s our look at Tuesday’s games. ** Notre Dame at Iowa Pomeroy says: Iowa by 12 The teams: Notre Dame has played the third-weakest schedule

It was while watching a Purdue team fall to Nebraska in the first round of the Big Ten Tournament last year that I assured my colleague, Tom Dienhart, that the Boilermakers were simply in a rebounding season. They would be back next year, I told him, and I had no reservations about that. And why wouldn’t they be? The team returned a little over two-thirds of last year’s minutes, and last year wasn’t all that bad. Sure, it wasn’t up to Matt Painter’s usual standards, but the team was a significant upgrade over the likes of Northwestern, Penn State, and,

Iowa and Penn State both lost heartbreakers in their respective tournament title games Saturday. Villanova topped the Hawkeyes in overtime in the Battle 4 Atlantis championship, while Ole Miss nipped the Nittany Lions in the Barclays Center Classic final. Nebraska, however, topped NIU. Catch up on all the day’s action in this post. VILLANOVA 88, IOWA 83 (OT) | RECAP | BOX | PLAY-BY-PLAY Tournament MVP James Bell scored 20 points and sparked a huge Villanova rally, Josh Hart added 16 off the bench and the Wildcats beat No. 23 Iowa 88-83 in overtime to claim the Battle 4 Atlantis

While most of the nation feasted, several Big Ten teams were playing for tournament hardware. Let’s get right into the meat and potatoes of what’s worth knowing. ** Wisconsin rolled to the Cancun Challenge title with a workmanlike victory over West Virginia. The Badgers jumped out to a 17-point lead late in the first half, and the Mountaineers were never able to get within a possession the rest of the way. After settling for a complementary role the past couple games, Sam Dekker resumed his rightful place as Wisconsin’s offensive centerpiece, scoring 21 points on 14 shots. It’s early, but